"Traveling Through Time" Hard to Sit Through

About 65 individuals had a difficult time sitting through the Traveling Through Time seminar with speaker William Dollarhide. Within minutes of his opening remarks there was a desire to leave the room and research.

The first session of the all-day seminar was titled “Dollarhide’s Five Rules – Essentials for

Successful Genealogical Research.” Rule number 1 was “Treat the brothers and sisters of your ancestors as equals.” With this rule Dollarhide encouraged everyone to obtain those important census records, vital records, and various historical documents on all collateral lines. He provided a great case study of locating his own Dollarhide Family Bible by following this rule. Most genealogists, he explained, focus so closely on their ancestral line that they overlook the very important clues that are available by examining records left behind by aunts, uncles, and cousins of every generation. With this he also told everyone that they had an awful lot of work to do. It was a difficult way to begin the day as we knew that we were only beginning to understand how little we had done.

In his second session Dollarhide taught about the American Migration Routes from 1750 to 1800. With easy delivery, as if he was explaining something very simple to an attentive child, he took us on a tour of how one road was built to lead to the need for another, or to connect an already important route. He explained that many of those same routes are still being used today and encouraged us to acquire a 1941 Rand McNally Road Atlas. The Interstate System was not developed until 1956 so many of the most used roads were built on historically proven routes developed over several hundreds of years of travel.

The Civil War created a massive amount of records, many are still available today. Not all of these were federal records either. In Dollarhide’s session titled “Genealogical Resources of the Civil War Era” he gave us information on where to look, both online and on microfilm at the Family History Library, for records created during this time.

The day ended with tools to find living people by using online resources. Dollarhide shared the story of his own research in the 1970s. City directories and telephone books were extremely important and he lived mere blocks away from the Pacific Bell Telephone Company. He spent weeks pouring through various telephone books in order to locate other people with the surname of Dollarhide. The Internet has provided many websites that have taken away the need for telephone books, yet the information is still available if a researcher knows where to look. He endorsed ZabaSearch.com as a free website that was worth a visit that would provide at least a 75% success rate. Pages of additional websites were also provided to help fill in the 25% gap of information.

The day was packed full with easy to understand methods and freely provided tools. Instead of rushing to research we stayed, partially because we were stunned with the amount of information that we were being given. The other reason we stayed is that the Reata Springs Baptist Church was a wonderful and comfortable venue. The salad and sandwich buffet, stocked by the church’s teens, made a perfect lunch which was enjoyed at round banquet tables decorated with interesting and beautiful historical artifacts. There were Door Prizes, a Silent Auction, and Show and Tell items that also kept our interest.

When we left we hit the digital highway to look for a variety of documents and information that we may have never really examined before listening to William Dollarhide. We may have even done a few ZabaSearch.com queries to find our long lost friends and tell them about our wonderful day at the Traveling Through Time seminar.

Traveling Through Time

William Dollarhide

Saturday, September 12, William Dollarhide will be the speaker for the TriCity Genealogical Society seminar titled “Traveling Through Time.” The seminar will be held at the Reata Springs Baptist Church located at 2881 Leslie Road in Richland, Washington.

Many genealogists are familiar with the name Dollarhide, and there are obvious reasons. He has authored over 120 magazine articles and over 30 books. His book Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920 is one of the top-5 best-selling genealogy books in America. He is also well known as a national speaker, speaking to genealogy audiences in more than 45 states. In addition to speaking at local and state level seminars and conferences he has instructed several classes at the national level in conferences sponsored by the National Genealogical Society and the Federation of Genealogical Societies. His credentials include honors of “Award of Merit” from the American Society of Genealogists and an “Award of Appreciation” from the National Genealogical Society along with many “Awards of Appreciation” from state level societies.

The TriCity Genealogical Society is honored to sponsor this seminar, in which William Dollarhide will focus on four lectures. The titles of these lectures are “Dollarhide’s Five Rules,” “American Migration Routes 1750-1800,” “Civil War Genealogy,” and “Finding Living Relatives Online.” A traveling bookstore containing many Dollarhide books will be available at the seminar.

Registration to the “Traveling Through Time” seminar is open to the public. The costs is $35.00 and includes lunch if submitted before August 15^th. To register, download a registration form from www.tricitygenealogicalsociety.org and send it to TriCity Genealogical Society, PO Box 1410, Richland WA 99352. For more information contact Susan Davis Faulkner at denmother4@hotmail.com or 509-554-1050.

Benefits of Membership Explained by Kathy Weddle Sizer

Kathy Weddle Sizer, President of the Yakima Valley Genealogical Society, has been a member for

over 40 years. On June 10, 2015 she explained the benefits of society membership and active participation to those attending the TriCity Genealogical Society meeting. As with any other organization, club, or society, membership in a genealogical society can provide companionship which without effort leads to mentorship. Hiking can be done alone. It is not wise but it is possible. Someone that is interested in hiking would benefit by joining an organization where they can learn more about terrains, gear, and methods. The same is true for genealogy. It too can be done in solitude but the void created by solitary research can lead to innocent mistakes.

Kathy provided an example that was close to home. Her niece found Kathy’s grandmother’s name listed on the Social Security Death Index. Using the location of Kathy’s grandmother’s last benefit location as her place of death, she made a grave error. Kathy’s grandmother died in Union Gap but her last Social Security benefit was received in Cle Elum. Kathy’s niece innocently used the Cle Elum location as her place of death. This error is now available for others to copy from Ancestry.com Members Public Trees. Had Kathy’s niece attended meetings and interacted with other researchers she would have known that there can easily be a difference between the last benefit location and the death location. Kathy also pointed out that many errors like this are available to copy from various sites online and warned researchers about the fallacies available in online family trees.

Interacting with other researchers can help someone tear down brick walls. Many a seasoned genealogist is happy to share the methods that lead to their own personal victories that can also be repeated by researchers struggling to understand the best way to prove historical facts. There are also seasoned genealogists who focus on particular studies like medical information or military involvement. Kathy shared stores about adoption cases that were solved by following leads made available from other members or presentations at meetings.

There is strength in numbers. A society represents a group of people and through their efforts great repositories can be created. Kathy gave many examples of what can be found at the Yakima Valley Genealogical Society library but also provided personal stories of great discoveries she had experienced by researching at genealogical societies close to her ancestral homes.

Kathy summarized her presentation by saying, “My membership in my local society is the best gift I can give myself.” Kathy’s devotion to local societies was not only enthusiastically testified verbally but also visually. Even an arm in a sling didn’t hold her back from enjoying the TriCity Genealogical Society meeting.

April 8, 2015 TCGS Meeting with Richard Allen

Last Wednesday evening Richard Allen, Director of the Richland Family History Center (FHC) and TriCity Genealogical Society (TCGS) member gave an excellent presentation to the membership at the monthly meeting at the Clover Island Inn, Kennewick.  Richard’s presentation was called “New items at the Richland FHC and how to use some of the older sources”.  Richard started his talk by giving some of the history of the FHC and its association with TCGS.  Richard then went on to describe some upcoming changes to the infrastructure of the FHC to make it more appealing to patrons. 

Richard described the holdings at the FHC and that a project is ongoing to re-catalog the books and get the catalog on line.  Richard showed the members present that you could go to FamilySearch and using their catalog search engine locate the holdings for the Richland FHC.

Richard then gave a presentation showing that not all information is online by walking through some research that he had done where much of the information came from the FHC holdings.  Some this information has never been digitized and put on the internet.

This section fitted in nicely with the Archived Document Contest that TCGS is running through the beginning of next year.   (Go to the TCGS website for more information on this contest)

One other item that came up during Richard’s presentation was that the Richland FHC has some books that even the Family History Library in Salt Lake City does not have in their collections. 

So just don’t do your research online check out the Family History Centers, Family History Library, local libraries, etc as you look for the dead.

John F Covey

TCGS President

In March 2015 We Met The Archivist

Brigid Clift, Central Region Archivist for the Washington State Archives, provided a transparent view of her activities and responsibilities as the Archivist of government records last night to the TriCity Genealogical Society.

There are various reasons why government agency records need to be retained. Some retention schedules require that the records be held for 99 years or permanently! As the Archivist, Brigid answers many questions on how long records need to be kept. She also collects records from various agencies and takes them to the Central Region Branch of the Washington State Archives for storage. The Central Region Archives provides archival and records management services for Benton, Chelan, Douglas, Franklin, Grant, Kittitas, Klickitat, Okanogan, and Yakima county government agencies. The facility is state-of-the-art and Brigid encouraged those planning on attending the 2015 Washington State Genealogical Society conference to tour the Archives while in Ellensburg.

Brigid shared copies of various types of records to provide an idea of what is available at the Archives. She encouraged genealogists to interact with her. A major function of her job is obtaining material. She does this with the desire to share what she has collected. She explained three ways that she shares information from the Archives; requests, visits, and volunteer interaction.

Look-ups and research requests can be sent to CEBranchArchives@sos.wa.gov. Brigid explained that she enjoys providing this type of service but encouraged some work on the part of the researcher before sending a request. Record groups descriptions, including date range and volume size, is available at www.sos.wa.gov/archives/archives_central.aspx. The most productive requests fit within the description of the record group. If a date in not known, a date range should be provided in the request.

Due to budget cuts the Central Region Archives has limited hours for visits. It is important to call or email before visiting to ensure that the archives are open and that someone is available to pull requested records. Brigid encouraged a review of the holdings before a visit. A review of the volume size gives the researcher information to plan how long their research efforts may take. Some record groups are indexed and some are not. This information is also available in the holdings list.

The Genealogical Society of Utah has recently scanned a large amount of images for the Central Region Archives. Volunteers can help with indexing these scanned images which is necessary before they become searchable online through the Digital Archives. To set up an account to help with this project go to scribe.digitalarchives.wa.gov or contact the Historical Records Project at hrp@sos.wa.gov for more information.

It was a treat to have Brigid speak at the TriCity Genealogical Society March meeting. We got to learn that Archivists are real people who love the records that they take care of and that they want to share these records. She represented the role of Archivist, of which there are many. Brigid reminded us that each state government and archive has its own way of conducting business.

June 13th Meeting Features Guest Speaker, Donna Potter Phillips

For TCGS Members, having Donna come speak to our society has become a yearly treat, this year no exception.

Donna always brings an interesting and inspiring presentation but this year she has chosen to bring us an eclectic look at genealogy “… or at least a new way to teach something old. Our upcoming seminar will prove that once again. Donna is coming with her netbook and six pages of questions, news, notes and answers and we will all talk at once and learn together. She advises that you do bring a notebook for taking notes; she offers no handout as she expects you will jot down the points that YOU need. Come learn with us!”

Donna’s upbeat personality and interesting lectures always bring fun to learning genealogy. No one can ever walk away without having learned something.

Please mark your calendars for this special presentation sure to inspire all of us in pursuit of our family’s history.